


A Troubled Mind

by joely_jo



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Goodbyes, Love, missing moment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-15
Updated: 2013-07-15
Packaged: 2017-12-20 07:49:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/884792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joely_jo/pseuds/joely_jo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Robert's request for Ned to become his Hand, the decision weighs heavily on Ned's mind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Troubled Mind

**Author's Note:**

> A brief out take where I imagine the missing detail from the 'aching loins' chapter!

Up on the battlements it was cold, and the wind was biting at his cheeks, draining the blood in them away. But it was quiet and Ned was grateful for the solitude. Here there were no voices clamouring in his ears, no laughter clashing with his troubled thoughts and the music was but a distant tune that was blown away in snatches by the gusting wind.

Robert’s request weighed like a corpse across his shoulders. He had known it was coming, but the knowledge had not made him any wiser. He did not know what to do. Leaving Winterfell, leaving his family and his lady wife… it was something he had hoped never to have to do again. He had thought to die in this place, old and grey, with his children at his side and Catelyn’s hand in his. Now he was being asked to forsake all that and manage the realm while Robert pissed his power away in wine sinks and whore houses. The thought made him bitter.

He looked up at the cloudless sky, at the full moon that hung like an unwelcome watcher above him and wrapped his arms around himself, feeling strangely chilled to the bone. He took a step closer to the edge and peered over, looking down and down, towards the black ink of the moat beneath. The wind gusted behind him and for a heartbeat he wobbled. Bran would not blink to vault over this edge and squirrel to the ground and yet here he was gasping like a nervous child because his balance had been disturbed. He closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath and instead looked up at the clear night sky. Ten thousand stars glimmered and winked down at him.

A space in the hollow of his back tingled and he knew there was someone behind him. There had been no sound of footfalls, or if there had, he had been too absorbed in his own thoughts to have noticed them.

“Ned,” she called quietly, questioningly. He knew that voice anywhere. “I wondered where you had gone.”

At first he did not reply, could not reply, but stared fixedly at the waves of dark moorland rolling away from the castle and into the distance. Somewhere off to his right a wolf howled and, from the kennels, a dog answered. The sounds were so familiar that he almost ached to hear them, knowing how keenly he would feel their absence – Catelyn’s voice, the wolf, the wind as it whistled through an arrow slit. “I am here,” he said at length.

He turned, and unexpectedly, the world turned with him, so that for just a moment, she seemed to glitter like the stars.

His breath caught in his throat at the sight of her. She was just a few paces behind him, her dark blue dress seemingly almost black in the moonlight, soft tendrils of hair falling from the braid that chased its way down her back. Something almost physical knocked him back and sent him reeling. _What if I barely ever see her again?_ Robert had made some throwaway comment about bringing Catelyn and the children with him, but Ned knew that could never happen. There must always be a Stark in Winterfell, their children were still young, his place would be by the King’s side, and there were hundreds of leagues between King’s Landing and the North.

“I can see that,” she said with a small smile. But when she saw his face, the smile became a frown. “What is it, my love?”

Ned released some of the sigh that had built within him and his head drooped. Catelyn came to him and took his face in her hands.

“I do not think I need you to say,” she said. “I understand.”

_Of course she does,_ he thought. She kissed his forehead and smoothed her hands through his hair before wrapping him in her embrace. It felt a bit like they were already saying goodbye and that thought made Ned want to cry. But, as always, the tears would not come and so instead he breathed deep of the warm, soft scent that lingered on the nape of her neck.

The wind caught again at his cloak and he felt her shiver, so he took the edges of the fur-lined material and swept it around her, bundling her against him as if they were cocooned together. She laughed quietly as she linked her arms around his waist. “Fourteen years in this freezing place and still that north wind has the power to make me cower.”

“Yet it does not bow you,” he told her. “I think rather that it bows to you.”

“Hm,” she replied, neither agreeing nor disagreeing.

“You know of Robert’s request then?”

“Benjen told me.”

Ned nodded. He said nothing.

“Do you want to talk about it now?” she asked.  

He shook his head. He knew they would have to talk about it soon, but right now he wanted to lose himself in her embrace and forget about making decisions. There was time yet.

Catelyn reached up and cupped his face in her hands. She ran her fingers through his beard. “Come to bed?” She smiled at him.

It was not in him to refuse her then, so he let her take him by the hand and lead him down from the battlements, through the stone halls to her chambers. Far below, the sounds of music and laughter could still be heard, but here in his wife’s rooms it was quiet. No fire burned – none was ever really needed – but it was still warm. Ned stood just inside the door while she shrugged off her cloak and hung it from the hook on the back of the wardrobe, then came back to him.

They exchanged no words, but slowly began to remove one another’s clothing. His leather doublet went first, then his shirt and undershirt. His hands worked at the laces on her dress. When they were loosened, he pushed the material down over her arms and breasts and finally past her hips until it pooled at her feet. She stepped close to him then and lifted her face. Ned kissed her, softly at first, then with a growing fervour. Having her in his arms, feeling her body pliant against him, made him suddenly crave her, and before he was fully aware of what he was doing, he was tearing at her shift as he sought to feel her skin against his.

“Ned… Ned…” she murmured into his mouth and her hands were at the laces of his breeches, tugging with ineffectual fingers.

They paused, looking quickly at one another. If this had been any other night, they would have laughed then at their lustiness, but there was no place for laughter tonight. Instead, they were silent as they removed the last pieces of clothing and stepped back into each other’s embrace.

They held each other. Ned could feel his own heart beating, but he could feel Catelyn’s too, steady and firm against his chest. He sighed. He was going to miss her. He was going to miss the children, and Winterfell… his _home_.

It was too much. A hollow thing opened up inside him and he felt like he was suddenly being pulled towards it, as helpless as a newborn infant. He did not want to give it all up. _I will refuse him_ , he thought. _I will tell him that, no, my place is here and this is where I shall stay. He must respect my wishes._ Yet even as the thoughts filled his mind, he knew that Robert would do no such thing and the doubts resurfaced once again.

As if she could sense his despair, Catelyn took his hands and led him to the bed. It was her bed in name, but they had made all their children in this room, excepting Robb, and the walls were more familiar to Ned than those in his own rooms. He had spent thousands of nights in her arms in this room; he wanted to spend thousands more. Yet if he went to King’s Landing as Robert’s Hand, he might never have sight of it again.

The blankets and furs were thrown back and she tugged him down with her. She said nothing, but her lips moved over his face and body, kissing, touching, raising the hairs along his neck and back. He let her touch him and allowed her to guide them. Then, as she pushed him gently to his back and began to slide her lips down over his chest and belly, he caught her in his grip and stopped her. “No,” he murmured.

Her blue eyes questioned him, but he shook his head in affirmation of his wishes. He did not want what she was offering him right now. What he wanted was to feel her skin against his and hold her in his arms and here he could have his wishes. He pulled her down to him and then rolled to put her underneath him, her hands braced on either side of her.

Resting in the valley of her thighs, he stared down at her for a long moment, studying the lines of her face, the red halo of hair spread about the pillow, committing it all to memory. He leaned down to kiss her once more, then pushed his hips forward and pressed inside her.

Catelyn’s eyes closed. Together, their breath hitched, and then he was moving, gently and slowly at first, then with gathering force. He wanted to prolong the moment, but something primal had him in its grip and even as he tried to slow himself, it demanded noisily to be satisfied. Her hands were on his shoulders, pressing, kneading, feeling for the bones beneath the skin.

The truth was, Ned suddenly realised, that they had shaped one another over the years. Like potters working with clay they had created new forms for each other, shifted and changed, until they were now entirely different from how they had begun. It had been a long and sometimes painful business, but Ned was glad that they had not given up, for the end result was so much more than he had ever hoped for.

He kissed her again and kept up his pace, feeling her responding to him as he thrust, lifting her hips up to meet him. Her breath was hot against his neck. He heard soft cries and he knew that she was close. One hand snaked down between them and he pushed his thumb into her sex, pressing with practised firmness to coax her on. In response, her entire body tensed and then released in a shudder, as a shout muffled into his neck. He thrust harder and quicker, and then he was there as well, following her over the edge.

For a long moment, they held each other, their breath calming. Ned laid his head between her breasts and listened to the beat of her heart and sighed. He felt her hand reach up and smooth his hair and the gesture was so tender, so sympathetic, that he had to break away. He rolled off her and climbed from the bed. Naked and suddenly alone, the heat was more than he could bear and so he pulled back the tapestries at the windows and flung open every one of the windows. A sharp, cold gasp of air hit him in the face like a slap and he knew that their moment of forgetting was over.          


End file.
